Pre-Con†Stellation History

The science fiction/fantasy club NASFA (North Alabama Science Fiction Association) was founded in Huntsville AL circa 1980, partly as a result of local fans meeting at a one-time convention named MidSouthCon, held in Huntsville that year. (That convention is not directly related to the annual convention of the same name in Memphis TN.) NASFA members quickly came up with the idea of starting their own general-interest science fiction & fantasy convention(←What's That?). The first effort toward this was a small, one-day con named ZerCon (planned and executed mostly on the relaxicon(←What's That?) model), in November 1981. During the run-up to ZerCon, the club came up with the name "Con†Stellation" (or "Con*Stellation") for a planned ongoing series of longer (three-day) conventions. Both before and after ZerCon, various NASFAns also worked on other convention around the south to gain experience in how cons were run.

With a bunch of computer geeks in NASFA, the name ZerCon was a deliberate (if somewhat obscure) pun on "Zero Con" since it would be the "zeroth" convention sponsored by NASFA–so the first Con†Stellation could be numbered "one." ZerCon may hold the record for the coldest video room ever at a convention. The hotel allowed us to use a large-screen TV (then a rare thing) in an unused bar attached to the hotel. However, the one person who knew how to turn on the heat in the bar was out of the hotel that weekend so the temperature as folks huddled around the TV was little higher than that the below-freezing temps outside. At least we had fresh popcorn as the hotel also allowed us to use their commercial popper.

List of Con†Stellations

The first Con†Stellation was held 16–18 July 1982, under the full name Con†Stellation I: The Pleiades. The time of year varied a lot over the first few conventions before settling down to roughly the fall season. Each Con†Stellation has been subtitled with an astronomical constellation—usually one of the 88 official modern constellations. The con usually uses the constellation as a theme in its advertising and sometimes as a theme for events at the convention.

The Haldeman brothers were chosen as the closest thing we could get to twins (Gemini). Freas was unable to attend.

2.5

II.V

Ursa Minor

10-11 December 1983

Sheraton (University Drive)

Mike Kennedy, Nelda Kennedy

None

2-day "relaxicon" to break up the long span between Con†Stellations II and III as the convention shifted from spring (1983) to fall (1984). As the convention was already locked into using Roman numerals to number the cons, the nonsense numbering II.V (mixing Roman and Arabic (place) notation in a tongue-in-cheek fashion) was used.

Due to issues finding a suitable hotel, we had to skip having Con†Stellation in 2014. A number of local fans got together on the night of the monthly NASFA meeting for an extended evening of games and good fellowship.